Arno Zimmer - Death Comes to the Torpedo Factory

Willoughby stood up and lifted the coffee from Viola’s hand as he walked past her. “Much obliged, young lady,” he said to the back of her head.

VIOLA FINCH SMILED tentatively at her boss, hoping for some sign of appreciation, if not affection. Bellows hardly noticed, once again pre-occupied with thoughts of Woody Meacham and his own eagerness to speak to Helga Dumont. All he wanted now was privacy.

The telephone rang in the outer office and Viola rushed out to answer it while Bellows stood in the doorway. He heard her say “Yes sir, Mr. Armbruster, I’ll tell him.” She hung up the phone and turned to Bellows. “He said for you to drop whatever you’re doing and come down to his office now. I hope it has nothing to do with Scatcherd or that detective,” she said plaintively.

Bellows shrugged. Everything was urgent with Armbruster. He was the consummate bureaucrat who lived for protocol. Damn it, the call to Helga Dumont will have to wait, he said to himself.

WOODY WAS QUIET all morning while setting up the bar and it didn’t go unnoticed by Pudge. “Anything bothering you, kid, that you want to talk about?” he asked. Woody shook his head and said, “Yeah, Pudge, but not right now.” Pudge wasn’t the sort to press anyone unless it was urgent. He felt certain that Woody would open up before long. He knew they needed to come clean with Willoughby regarding the Polaroid facsimile sent to Prof. Humboldt. Without thinking, Pudge had acted brashly and gone out on a limb for Woody. He hoped it would not ruin his friendship with the detective.

WILLOUGHBY LEFT BELLOWS’ office and walked up the stairwell where Scatcherd had fallen to his death. He went down the long hallway to the clerical section. Bellows was truthful about one thing – sealed boxes were everywhere in anticipation of the move. Willoughby stood by the coat rack in the hallway. There was a long row of hooks and all but a few were occupied.

Before leaving the Torpedo Factory, Willoughby stopped by the security chief’s office. He told Snavely about the official ruling on Scatcherd’s death and, after some small talk, Willoughby asked if there was a locksmith within walking distance of the Torpedo Factory.

“There’s a little shop called Lock & Load, if you can believe it. Clever name, eh? Run by an ex-navy guy by the name of Jasper Pendleton. Over on South Union, just south of King. What’s up, Hank?”

Oh, just a crazy hunch. Probably nothing. Thanks,” Willoughby said as he walked away.

WHEN WILLOUGHBY WALKED into the Lock & Load, a bell rang over the door and a short, wiry man with close-cropped salt and pepper hair emerged from the back room. Willoughby flashed his badge and Pendleton tensed up. “Anything wrong, detective?”

“Nothing at all but I’m hoping that you can help me out. Snavely at the Torpedo Factory sent me over. Do you by chance have a key-making machine?”

Pendleton laughed derisively and said, “Yeah, and I’d like to get my hands on the salesman who convinced me to buy it. Boy, was he slick. He’s the kind of guy that could coax a pack of hungry dogs off a meat wagon.”

“Not a lot of customers, I gather?” Willoughby said, trying to sound sympathetic but quickly realizing that the paucity of customers requesting duplicate keys would make his inquiry more productive. He described Bellows and Pendleton bit his lip and shook his head no.

“How about a girl, maybe so tall?” Willoughby asked next, leveling his arm about 5’ from the ground. Pendleton grinned broadly. “Damn, you got ESP or something? She was my last customer, for the key machine, that is. Perky little number. In a big hurry, said she had to get back to work. Yeah, now that I think about it, she was kind of agitated.”

As Willoughby was leaving, Pendleton stopped him and asked, “Hey, did anyone ever tell you –?” He was interrupted by Willoughby saying, “Yeah, he’s my twin brother. We flipped a coin and he got to play the detective on television.” Willoughby kept walking, leaving the shop owner scratching his head.

WILLOUGHBY KNEW HE would need to find the right moment to confront Bellows. He had lied to him and that pissed him off but as he reflected further, it might mean nothing at all in the grand scheme of things. Breaking and entering was serious stuff but nothing compared to murder – unless he could use Viola Finch’s foray on her boss’ behalf to make someone – anyone – talk about the circumstances of Scatcherd’s death. Bellows was clearly using his assistant in his frantic effort to get the photographs back and, no doubt, she was a willing accomplice. He had seen those doe eyes she had fixated on the archivist. Willoughby was starting to form a different opinion of Viola Finch. He knew that she regularly met her friend, Amanda Silverbridge, in the clerical area and they went down to the cafeteria for lunch. She must have lifted Scatcherd’s keys from his jacket hanging on the coat rack, rushed over to Lock & Load to make a duplicate key and replaced Scatcherd’s keys before he knew they were missing. The little bird had some moxy, he said to himself. Maybe it was time for him to take up bird-watching.

It was getting near noon and Willoughby wanted to see Woody but lunch hour was not the best time to walk into Pudge McFadden’s. He wanted to talk to Caldigate one last time before the medical examiner authorized the disposal of Scatcherd’s body.

“TELL ME YOU found a relative or friend to claim Scatcherd,” Caldigate said as soon as Willoughby walked into his office. “Thorne called here, all officious sounding, and asked if I knew about some relative in Sheboygan Falls. Are you playing with him again, Hank?” Caldigate was trying to look serious but even the tightly-wound medical examiner couldn’t suppress a grin.

“I looked in the telephone book and our corpse was the only Scatcherd listed,” Willoughby said by way of explanation. “Nice detective work,” said Caldigate. They both smiled.

“I need one last look at Scatcherd, Sandy. This morning, I caught two people who had it in for him in a lie. Something about the body is still bugging me.” There was a brief stare down and Caldigate said, “The official cause of death is accidental, Hank, so I’m going to pretend that you were not here today, okay? Now, let’s get this over with.”

When Caldigate unzipped the bag, Willoughby noticed that Scatcherd’s mouth was now shut and he almost looked peaceful. Probably for the first time, he thought to himself. He homed in on Scatcherd’s chest and the two distinct bruises that had troubled him from the start.

“So, correct me if I’m wrong but these chest bruises likely occurred at the time of death and not post-mortem, right?” Caldigate nodded and Willoughby went on. “Okay, the man falls backward down the stairs with extensive damage to the back of his head but still has two chest bruises. What caused them?”

“Listen, Hank. I did not say that the bruises occurred exactly at the time of death and I’m not saying it now. He could have had an accident or a confrontation earlier in the day totally unrelated to his fall.”